Hesya Mirovna (Meerovna) Helfman (, ) 1855,
Mazyr russian: Мозырь
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— 1 (
N.S. 13) February 1882,
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
), was a Russian
revolutionary
A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates a revolution. The term ''revolutionary'' can also be used as an adjective, to refer to something that has a major, sudden impact on society or on some aspect of human endeavor.
...
member of ''
Narodnaya Volya
Narodnaya Volya ( rus, Наро́дная во́ля, p=nɐˈrodnəjə ˈvolʲə, t=People's Will) was a late 19th-century revolutionary political organization in the Russian Empire which conducted assassinations of government officials in an att ...
'', who was implicated in the
assassination of Tsar Alexander II.
Biography
Early life
Born into a
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
family, Helfman left home for
Kiev
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...
at the age of 16 or 17, allegedly to avoid an
arranged marriage
Arranged marriage is a type of marital union where the bride and groom are primarily selected by individuals other than the couple themselves, particularly by family members such as the parents. In some cultures a professional matchmaker may be us ...
, where she found employment in a sewing factory.
Revolutionary activities
In the early 1870s, Helfman was an active member of several revolutionary clubs in Kiev where she met, among others,
Leo Deutsch
Lev Grigorievich Deutsch, also known as Leo Deutsch (russian: Лев Григо́рьевич Дейч) (September 26, 1855 – August 5, 1941) was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and one of four founding members of Russia's Marxist Organisation, ...
and her future husband . Helfman was sentenced to two years' imprisonment at the during the 1877 , and on 14 March 1879 was sent into
exile
Exile is primarily penal expulsion from one's native country, and secondarily expatriation or prolonged absence from one's homeland under either the compulsion of circumstance or the rigors of some high purpose. Usually persons and peoples suf ...
to the
province Novgorod.
She escaped a few months later and joined ''
Narodnaya Volya
Narodnaya Volya ( rus, Наро́дная во́ля, p=nɐˈrodnəjə ˈvolʲə, t=People's Will) was a late 19th-century revolutionary political organization in the Russian Empire which conducted assassinations of government officials in an att ...
'' in
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
, probably following her husband who was a member of the organization's executive committee. In 1881 Helfman was part of the ''Narodnaya Volya'' group that
assassinated Alexander II, albeit not in a front-line position; she was assigned to run a conspiratorial flat, where she lived with another member of the group,
Nikolai Sablin
Nikolai Alekseyevich Sablin (russian: Никола́й Алексе́евич Са́блин), was the son of a petty landowner, was born in 1849 or 1850 (sources vary). While at Moscow University he became involved in revolutionary politics as a ...
,
as an unsuspicious apparent married couple. When the police raided their apartment, two days after the deadly attack on the tsar, Sablin shot himself while she was captured.
Death
![Kolodkevich2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fd/Kolodkevich2.jpg)
During the
Pervomartovtsy
Pervomartovtsy (russian: Первома́ртовцы; a compound term literally meaning ''those of March 1'') were the Russian revolutionaries, members of ''Narodnaya Volya'', planners and executors of the assassination of Alexander II of ...
trial
In law, a trial is a coming together of Party (law), parties to a :wikt:dispute, dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence (law), evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to Adjudication, adjudicate claims or d ...
in March 1881, Helfman refused to admit her guilt, but was nonetheless sentenced to death by
hanging
Hanging is the suspension of a person by a noose or ligature around the neck.Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Hanging as method of execution is unknown, as method of suicide from 1325. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that hanging i ...
for her alleged part in the assassination of the tsar. A few hours after being convicted, she made a statement that "in view of the ... sentence I have received, I consider it my moral duty to declare that I am in the fourth month of
pregnancy
Pregnancy is the time during which one or more offspring develops ( gestates) inside a woman's uterus (womb). A multiple pregnancy involves more than one offspring, such as with twins.
Pregnancy usually occurs by sexual intercourse, but ca ...
". Her husband Nikolay Kolodkevich had also been arrested in January 1881. According to contemporary law execution of pregnant women was banned as the fetus was considered innocent. Therefore, Helfman's execution was officially postponed until forty days after childbirth, and in the meantime she would stay in the harsh
Peter and Paul Fortress
The Peter and Paul Fortress is the original citadel of St. Petersburg, Russia, founded by Peter the Great in 1703 and built to Domenico Trezzini's designs from 1706 to 1740 as a star fortress. Between the first half of the 1700s and early 1920s i ...
prison.
Three months later, thanks to the campaign against her execution by Socialists in Western Europe and in the foreign press, Helfman's sentence was commuted to an indefinite period of
katorga
Katorga ( rus, ка́торга, p=ˈkatərɡə; from medieval and modern Greek: ''katergon, κάτεργον'', "galley") was a system of penal labor in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union (see Katorga labor in the Soviet Union). Prisoner ...
. She was transferred back to the
remand prison
Remand, also known as pre-trial detention, preventive detention, or provisional detention, is the process of detaining a person until their trial after they have been arrested and charged with an offence. A person who is on remand is held i ...
where she had been held before. On 5 July (
NS), whilst still in the Peter and Paul Fortress and by permission of the Minister of the Interior,
Count Ignatiev, she was granted an interview (which lasted almost an hour and a half) with a journalist from the newspaper ''Golos'' who was accompanied by her defence counsel at her trial, a lawyer named Goerke. During the course of this interview, she complained about the lack of "proper medical and female attendance".
Helfman gave birth in
detention in October 1881. Upon the request of the Department of Police, her childbirth was assisted by a
gynaecologist
Gynaecology or gynecology (see American and British English spelling differences, spelling differences) is the area of medicine that involves the treatment of women's diseases, especially those of the reproductive organs. It is often paired with ...
who was also employed by the Imperial court, something unprecedented. She had a severe
maternal complication, as her
perineum
The perineum in humans is the space between the anus and scrotum in the male, or between the anus and the vulva in the female. The perineum is the region of the body between the pubic symphysis (pubic arch) and the coccyx (tail bone), includi ...
was torn. It was rumoured that the gynaecologist had refused the prison doctor's suggestion to sew the wound together; in any case, it never healed. She remained delirious during some of the
postnatal period. By 24 November, she had developed
peritonitis
Peritonitis is inflammation of the localized or generalized peritoneum, the lining of the inner wall of the abdomen and cover of the abdominal organs. Symptoms may include severe pain, swelling of the abdomen, fever, or weight loss. One part or ...
, which became acute on 17 January 1882. She nevertheless nursed her daughter from her birth in October until 25 January, when the baby was taken away from her, placed in an orphanage and registered as a child of unknown parents. According to the subsequent medical report, the peritonitis became general and caused
fever
Fever, also referred to as pyrexia, is defined as having a body temperature, temperature above the human body temperature, normal range due to an increase in the body's temperature Human body temperature#Fever, set point. There is not a single ...
on the same day. Six days later, Helfman died. Her child died of an unknown disease shortly thereafter.
Tsarist authorities had rejected the request of Kolodkevich's parents for the legal custody of the baby.
Kolodkevich died in prison in 1884.
Legacy
The importance of Helfman's role in the assassination was undetermined, and her Jewish origins stressed during the
pogroms
A pogrom () is a violent riot incited with the aim of massacring or expelling an ethnic or religious group, particularly Jews. The term entered the English language from Russian to describe 19th- and 20th-century attacks on Jews in the Russian ...
that followed the assassination.
[''Jewish Chronicle'', 6 May 1881; quoted in Benjamin Blech, ''Eyewitness to Jewish History''.] Another conspirator,
Ignacy Hryniewiecki
Ignacy Hryniewiecki or Ignaty Ioakhimovich Grinevitsky). (russian: Игнатий Гриневицкий, pl, Ignacy Hryniewiecki, be, Ігнат Грынявіцкі; — March 13, 1881) was a Polish member of the Russian revolutionary societ ...
, was also rumoured to be Jewish, though there seems to have been no basis for this.
Revolutionary
Sergey Stepnyak-Kravchinsky
Sergey Mikhaylovich Stepnyak-Kravchinsky (russian: Серге́й Миха́йлович Степня́к-Кравчи́нский; July 1, 1851 – 23 December 1895), known in the 19th century London revolutionary circles as Sergius Stepniak, was ...
dedicated a chapter of his ''Underground Russia'' (1883) to Helfman, the only one dedicated to a person he had not met personally.
Writes Stepnyak:
Notes
Citations
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Helfman, Hesya
1852 births
1882 deaths
People from Mazyr
People from Mozyrsky Uyezd
Belarusian Jews
Belarusian revolutionaries
Jewish socialists
Narodnaya Volya
Narodniks